step 5: digital media: PhotoshopFinishing up the piece I came across a dilemma. The blacks and whites were well balanced, but I felt that the rooster's facial features were getting lost. So I cheated and added color... Sometimes you just gotta know when you're beat.
Demon Rockabilly Rooster.
step 4: digital media: Photoshop (unfinished)Next step was to figure out what to do with a floating rooster head. As I had said previously in "step 2", I had no clue where this sketch was heading since I went in blindly. For some reason the rooster mohawk reminded me of a rockabilly style haircut. Another idea that popped into my head was to give the giant rooster head an octopus' lower body of tentacles...just for the sake of randomness. A few quick sketches later, it was decided that the former idea would win out.
step 3: digital media: Photoshop (unfinished)Decided not to use a pure white but instead a RGB:235 gray, so that the image would be a bit softer on the eyes. I wanted to be careful with the use of the white. Using it sparingly as lighting as well as to ground and punch up certain black lines and details.
step 2: digital media: Photoshop (unfinished)The rooster subject matter came about only after starting the piece. At the time of scribbling in the eyes and the main shape of the head I was thinking of the exercise of high contrast. Figuring I would need some sort of graphic element to punch up with black, I decided a mohawk would be an interesting element which I would be able to play around with. After a beak and a wattle later, a rooster came about.
step 1: digital media: Photoshop (unfinished)Here's the first of a five step sketch/high contrast rendering done completely in Photoshop. The exercise was to create a piece using high contrast black & white on a midtone background, much like a charcoal/conté drawing.
